This column is a real drag

Friday

State Sen. Steven C. Panagiotakos has the right idea when it comes to trying to dissuade drag racers from killing other people on the road.

Hey, Bay State drag racers: Fear this bill.

State Sen. Steven C. Panagiotakos has the right idea when it comes to trying to dissuade drag racers from killing other people on the road.

The Lowell Democrat is the author of Senate Bill No. 2083, which, if passed, would mandate prison time of up to 21⁄2 years for first-time offenders. Current state law punishes drag racers with fines of up to $500 and a loss of license for a month or two, but no jail.

The impetus for the Panagiotakos proposal was the 2005 death of 31-year-old Deborah Hornberger, a pregnant Leominster geologist who, along with her unborn child, was killed on the Lowell Connector by two men going more than 90 in a 55 mph zone.

Both of those men were sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty last year to motor vehicle homicide charges.

Panagiotakos was quoted recently as saying the following: “Everyone has been on the highway where two people are speeding up behind you, coming up on the inside and the outside and switching lanes.”

He’s absolutely right and the same holds true for the highways and byways in and around Bristol County. I’m willing to bet that nearly all of us have had the unsettling experience of driving 65 or 70 mph in the right-hand-lane of either Route 24 or Route 140, only to check the rear-view mirror and see two vehicles, side-by-side, boring down on us.

In that situation do you accelerate, make room for the terrorists-on-wheels by pulling into the breakdown lane or simply clutch some rosary beads and offer up a final prayer?

Chances are if one of them kills themselves — not to mention one of us innocent, law-abiding chumps — while in the pursuit of excellence as an illegal drag racer, they’ll likely end up rewarded by some friends or relatives with one of those makeshift memorials littering the local highways.

“I killed an innocent driver and all I got was this lousy cross,” the post-accident, memorial T-shirt should read.

Automatic jail time is what these speeding miscreants deserve.

And Panagiotakos is right: Toss them in a cell the first time they’re caught (which, as we know, isn’t necessarily the first time they’ve done it), before they’ve killed some square on his or her way home from work.

Naturally the threat of jail won’t work on everyone willing to put the rest of us and our children in jeopardy for the sake of a cheap thrill.

Nor will the argument that by severely injuring or killing themselves they’re also squandering their personal, God-given potential as a healthy, breathing human being — even on the narcissistic grounds that they’d be missing out on a lifetime’s worth of physical pleasure.

And I’m not so sure the guilt angle holds meaning for them either.

You can lecture them till you’re blue in the face that the blood of an innocent driver will forever be on their conscience — or, in the event of their own demise, would shame the family name — and chances are they would snicker.

I propose a supplemental punishment be added to the automatic prison time outlined by Bill 2083, one that would add a meaningful, material sting.

In a nutshell, just after sentencing has been handed down, begin the process of confiscating the subject’s car, truck or motorcycle.

It should be auctioned off with proceeds going to local law enforcement for the eventual purchase of new cruisers, or some other enforcement-related piece of equipment.

If a buyer can’t be found simply crush it and sell off the scrap. Oh, and insist that the previous owner be forced to watch the video.

Think I’m kidding? If you’ve got a better idea then let me know. Better yet, call Sen. Marc Pacheco or Rep. Jim Fagan and give them a piece of your mind before you or someone for whom you care is injured or killed.

This week a man driving a motorcycle through the Myles Standish Industrial Park was killed when he slammed into a truck trying to make a turn. He was, unfortunately, by all accounts driving too fast, but he wasn’t racing against anyone.

A woman I know, who lives not far from the industrial park, the next day told me that later that night she heard the telltale sounds she and others in the neighborhood have come to recognize: That of vehicles racing up and down John Hancock Road.

Not only do these brats on wheels spit in the eye of society, they have zero honor or compassion for someone who only an hour or two before, and on the same road, lost his life while enjoying the sensation of driving fast.

Let’s hope the Panagiotakos bill eventually becomes law. It’s a good start.

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